Impressions from early-access streams

[FStefanak]

In other words, people seem to assume that

fleet ~ army group (people rarely operate / give orders on this level in land combat, they usually just put armies together for bonuses)
task force ~ army (the highest level they give orders on, division microing possible)

But the dev intention seems to be more like:

fleet ~ army (high level orders)
task force ~ division (microing possible but intended to be left for AI)

 

[REDDQ]

Might as well throw these in here:

When you ride alone, you ride with Adolf, huh? I've seen this happen, hopefull it will be touched some day.

 

[Fulmen]

Having to use more fleets as opposed to mostly 1-2 doomstacks is the right approach, but has the UI been updated for it accordingly? For example can I select multiple, possibly all of my fleets at once with a single click of a button and order all the damaged ships in those dozens of fleets to split off and go repair, or my obsolete ships to go refit? Or must I go through each fleet manually, greatly increasing the amount of clicks compared to pre-MtG?

 

[PrinceOfMacedon]

D-Day requires planning and securing the two oceans are necessary before it. The timeline for D-Day has been pushed to more authentic time.

What does authentic time means? 1944?
Does that means MP games will last to 1945?

 

[Fulmen]

When you ride alone, you ride with Adolf, huh? I've seen this happen, hopefull it will be touched some day.

Come now, clearly USA had infinite fuel in WW2 and never had any need for rationing.

 

[CyberianK]

also they have a -35% discount on tank production

Can you provide details what that is?

 

[Deinhardt]

Can you provide details what that is?

The US has a Tank designer that lowers Produktion cost, aswell as a focus rather down the focus tree, that also reduces produktion costs of tanks.

 

[Fulmen]

also they have a -35% discount on tank production

I was told it's -25%, but due to some weirdness in the calculations that translates to like 33% more tanks. They also have one for TDs that also gives combat bonuses. But apparently no fighter focus. Maybe the Tizard Mission still gives a FTR research bonus.

I can understand the production bonus given their huge historical production figures (though it might need to be toned down - also Russia if anyone should also have one), but not too sure of the combat bonus. What's the historical precedence to it? Weren't German TDs generally more effective anyway? Sounds to me like PDX decided "we'll throw this in so USA has something cool and unique", disregarding any historical logic to it. Then again, they do that with every focus tree all the time, so I'm not surprised.

EDIT:

The US has a Tank designer that lowers Produktion cost, aswell as a focus rather down the focus tree, that also reduces produktion costs of tanks.

Ah, maybe the total tank discount is -35% then.

 

[iDovke]

Can you provide details what that is?

I heard from someone else that iirc there is a tank design company (that unlocks after a certain focus) that gives that buff to you.

 

[Deinhardt]

. What's the historical precedence to it? Weren't German TDs generally more effective anyway?

Well the US TD's wherent bad. THe Hellcat was a very agile, turret TD, that performed very well against the german tanks. They definately had speed going for them, aswell as more flexibility, due to the turret.

German TD's generally performed well, because of the experienced crews and their tactics. Ambush and counterattacks contributed significantly to their effectiveness and those shine best in a defensive position.

I think that a general buff for the US TD's is generally unecessary though.

 

[podcat]

I fail to catch a single tank buff.

aye. we decided to hold off on it for release until we can see what people do with the new meta

I think Paradox should try to explain the system better in some way, such as by some in-depth tutorial video or guide.

We are actually working on making a set of naval learning videos for this purpose

fleet ~ army (high level orders)
task force ~ division (microing possible but intended to be left for AI)

yes, pretty much

 

[Fulmen]

Btw has anyone seen if they fixed air wings gaining mission efficiency while not flying?

 

[James Hale]

@podcat

Just saw this on a stream, and even the streamer doesn't know what it means.

A number of UK ministers have 'Stanley Baldwin - 10%', but -10% what? What does it mean/do? It seems odd, and there's no tooltip to say what the -10% is supposed to be a reduction in.

 

[Fulmen]

@podcat

Just saw this on a stream, and even the streamer doesn't know what it means.

A number of UK ministers have 'Stanley Baldwin - 10%', but -10% what? What does it mean/do? It seems odd, and there's no tooltip to say what the -10% is supposed to be a reduction in.

PP cost, it's just missing the PP icon. No doubt a bug.

 

[GeorgieBest]

In other words, people seem to assume that

fleet ~ army group (people rarely operate / give orders on this level in land combat, they usually just put armies together for bonuses)
task force ~ army (the highest level they give orders on, division microing possible)

But the dev intention seems to be more like:

fleet ~ army (high level orders)
task force ~ division (microing possible but intended to be left for AI)

I haven't played for a while. Are the Field Marshal front orders still completely worthless?

 

[Zwirbaum]

@podcat

Just saw this on a stream, and even the streamer doesn't know what it means.

A number of UK ministers have 'Stanley Baldwin - 10%', but -10% what? What does it mean/do? It seems odd, and there's no tooltip to say what the -10% is supposed to be a reduction in.

Stanley Baldwin now has trait that increases political power gain by 5% and reduces the cost of Political Advisors by 10%.

 

[ruzen]

What does authentic time means? 1944?
Does that means MP games will last to 1945?

Well I wouldn't say affecting that much due to US & UK gathering high war support early on now but they do need to clear Atlantic from submarines in order to ensure convoy safety and that requires higher tech
Edit: Also, from what I've seen in MP games, people are really have to organize better fleet composition in order to spot and engage submarines or even dedicate an entirely new fleet to pasively clear the mines.

 

[Deinhardt]

irst, carrier hangars have no spotting bonuses. Making catapults planes on cruisers and battleships better at spotting. Crazy unrealistic

This probably more a choice for the sake of gameplay. If carriers can spot better then cruisers and destroyers, they take a role away from them. Maybe this is done to stop players from simply producing carriers.

Also isnt the point of the new Naval Gameplay, that you have your strike forces with carriers and battleships sit in port, until one of your spotting fleets finds the enemy? I dont know how sensible it is to put a carrier group out there to play hide and seek with the enemy.

 

[Zwirbaum]

It's painful to see some random "creators" (especially the annoying and the clueless ones) have a week long head start when none of us could get it. But I'm too salty, don't mind me saying that.

Initial reaction - ship designer looks as great as I hoped it would. Rule the Waves vibe is definitely there, and I really appreciate it. Fleets/TF OOB/Chain of command is hard to feel without actually playing it myself.

Fleet Reserves, a feature that almost none of the "creators" showcased, is the most helpful one. Way less micro. However, I'm not sure how the TF template/Repairs/Reserves system deals with heavily damaged ships. Like, if a ship requires 6 months+ of repairs, IMO it should be detached from the fleet and moved to Reserve in order to be repaired. Which should allow another ship from Reserves (non-damaged) to be attached there as a replacement. But I don't think that it actually works that way in the game. It appears that you'd have to manually look for heavy damage (long duration repair) and detach them yourself.

What I did notice is that some ship modules have unrealistic stats. First, carrier hangars have no spotting bonuses. Making catapults planes on cruisers and battleships better at spotting. Crazy unrealistic. Second, later Fire Control modules decrease ship's reliability. Eeewwwww. And don't even get me started on non-historical stats of starting US ships.... That, I'll just silently accept because it's fixable.

@podcat, would you comment on carrier spotting stats and Fire Control reliability debuffs, please?

Can't wait to test it all myself.

You can always park the carrier in the naval zone, and use it as floating airfield, therefore increasing/providing air superiority in said naval zone, and thus helping with the spotting.

IMO this makes more sense, than just providing flat spotting bonus for having carrier hangars, while having those unmanned by any planes.

 

[Alex_brunius]

What I did notice is that some ship modules have unrealistic stats. First, carrier hangars have no spotting bonuses. Making catapults planes on cruisers and battleships better at spotting. Crazy unrealistic.

Except that using floatplanes from cruisers and battleships to provide scouting was the established historical doctrine that for example Japan used at the time.

This is how they could launch so powerful and devastating Carrier strikes early in the war, because they didn't send out up to 25% of their Carriers planes on scouting missions like the US Carriers did.

The Japanese even developed a special type of cruisers to carry up to 6 float-planes each that could be responsible for scouting for their Carrier Strikeforce. This was the Tone Class.